After Importing Effects Sequence Bogged Down

[djohnson1810]

Hi.  I guess this probably makes sense but I wanted some verification.  I have imported my old sequence into xLights as effects that consist of mostly LOR channels (about 80).  Since doing that xlight will kind of freeze for 2-5 minutes every few minutes while I am trying to edit the sequence.  I spend more time waiting on xLights then sequencing.  I know that Importing Effects brings in a lot of data.  Is this normal for about 80 channels?  I know I can import it as a data layer but I was hoping I could do it this way.  I am using .47.

[dkulp]

If you go to Settings ->Auto Save, you can disable the auto save which is LIKELY the cause of the pause.    That said, 2-5 minutes is still pretty long.  What size is the resulting sequence?

[logandc99]

I would say Dan is dead right. I noticed the exact same thing with imported effects from a LOR sequence and it was indeed the auto save which is set to every 3mins as a default. Turning it off would eliminate it completely. I changed mine to every 15mins to still keep  the auto save fn but reduce the freezes. It's not an issue with sequences created entirely in Xlights, just those where you import LOR stuff.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Gilrock]

I've never looked into all the auto-save code but is it doing a full render?  I can't see why it's not just a few seconds to complete.

[keithsw1111]

It should just be writing the xml. Not the fseq and definitely no rendering.

[djohnson1810]

The xml file is 24.4 MB.  The fseq file is 63.1 MB.

I will try turning off the autosave and see if that helps and get back to you guys.  Thanks for the help.

[Phrog30]

As a reference, my largest xml is 0.5 mb. All of my lor stuff that I want to use is a data layer.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

[dkulp]

The xml file is 24.4 MB.  The fseq file is 63.1 MB.

I will try turning off the autosave and see if that helps and get back to you guys.  Thanks for the help.

24MB is a HUGE HUGE sequence.   Not exactly sure how 80 channels of LOR data would balloon up to that much.  That's gigantic.  First thing I would do is right click on each strand and hit the "promote node effects" and then right click on each model and click the "promote strand effects".   That may reduce this down a bit.

The only time I've seen one that big was importing a pixel tree sequence via an LMS file instead of the superstar. 

[djohnson1810]

I will try that.  I do have some RGB that I imported over. I am sure that is the issue.

[logandc99]

When I imported the holiday sequences Light of Christmas sequence for 12ribbon tree, I did the node mapping system. The xml file ended up quite large at 35mb ( fseq file is about 68mb). Whenever it auto saved I got a freeze for about a minute while it saved. You don't see any progress bar at the bottom of the screen so I presume it doesn't render but those files do take a while to save. Turning off auto save removes the issue.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Gilrock]

Even a 100mb I would expect to save in a couple seconds.  It should just be a file copy.  Something internally is holding off a thread.

[dkulp]

When I imported the holiday sequences Light of Christmas sequence for 12ribbon tree, I did the node mapping system. The xml file ended up quite large at 35mb ( fseq file is about 68mb).

Why would you do that instead of importing the SUP file?   The sup file would render in a few seconds whereas the 1000's of other effects take a LOT longer to render.

Whenever it auto saved I got a freeze for about a minute while it saved. You don't see any progress bar at the bottom of the screen so I presume it doesn't render but those files do take a while to save. Turning off auto save removes the issue.

The generating of the XML and the saving of the XML is done on the main thread.   That is done first (before rendering) to make sure any crashes during rendering don't cause loss of data.   

[logandc99]

I guess I must have done it the wrong way. Can't remember now where I found info that made me think  that was how I was supposed to do it. Oh well, next time...😊


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Boof63]

Have the same problem, it takes 409 secs to save and fseq = 188mg.
Sequence does have gifs and pix in it, so do they add up the meg?
Will try the auot save at 15 mins and see how i get on, thanks all
Cheers Boof63

[dkulp]

The fseq size is only a function of the number of channels and the number of frames in the sequence.   Even an empty sequence with no effects of the same length would result in the same size fseq.

Basically, the more channels you have (either in setup or in layout), the bigger.  The longer the song, the bigger.   If you drop from 50ms timing to 25ms, it doubles.